Concert club set for another season laden with quality acts

ILKLEY Concert Club announces the details of its 69th Season this week with the publication of the 2014/2015 season brochure.

The Club promises another series of outstanding concerts presenting music from across the centuries, from the seventeenth to the 21st performed by a diverse range of international soloists and groups.

One of the innovations this year will be a concert of songs and duets by Schubert, Schumann and Brahms given by two up-and-coming opera stars.

Among those making their Ilkley debuts this season are the French pianist, Jean-Efflam Bavouzet, Trio Apaches and the Heath Quartet.

Bavouzet is regarded as one of the most engaging live performers of his generation. Trio Apaches was founded recently by Ilkley favourite Ashley Wass with two of his friends in order to expand the trio repertoire: although named for a group of Paris-based artists in the years around 1900 they are rather proud that it means ‘hooligans’. The Heath quartet is one of the top quartets to come out of the RCNM in Manchester and is busy garnering accolades at home and abroad.

The opening concert on Wednesday, October 8, promises former BBC Young Musician of the Year, Natalie Clein, a cellist of exceptional talent, playing with Venezuelan pianist Sergio Tiempo. Natalie’s programme starts with one of Bach’s solo cello suites before she is joined by Sergio in sonatas by Mendelssohn and Shostakovich. Sergio will also play a selection of Chopin preludes, completing a diverse and rewarding concert.

Further performances of the same high quality follow: on November 12 the Heath Quartet will start with a Haydn quartet and finish with Beethoven’s late A minor quartet: the filling in this classical sandwich is Bartók’s sixth quartet.

Bartók and Beethoven also play a leading role in Jean-Efflam Bavouzet’s December concert contributing three piano sonatas, including Beethoven’s fiery Appassionata.

French music completes the programme with music by Ravel and contemporary composer Bruno Mantovani.

The Concert Club begins the New Year on January 7 with a programme of German romantic songs and duets entitled ‘A celebration of love’ presented by Swedish soprano, Malin Christensson, and Manchester-born tenor Joshua Ellicott with pianist Simon Lepper, well-known to Ilkley audiences.

February’s concert will be a treat for fans of music for wind instruments when one of the UK’s leading wind quintets, the Aurora Ensemble, come to the King’s Hall.

Twentieth-century works by Ibert, Ligeti, James Macmillan and Nielsenwill be interrupted by a piece from the early history of the wind quintet by Danzi and the whole rounded off with a performance of William Walton’s delightful Façade suite – music to sending you humming out into a chilly winter night!

On March 7 the three top calibre international soloists who make up Trio Apaches will bring a programme of piano trios by Frank Bridge and Shostakovich together with an intriguing arrangement of Debussy’s famous orchestral suite La Mer specially commissioned for their more intimate forces from composer Sally Beamish.

This season’s baroque concert is provided in April by La Serenissima, one of the leading exponents of the Italian baroque. They bring a varied programme of works for strings and continuo by Handel and his Italian contemporaries.

The season will be brought to a rousing finish on Wednesday May 6 with a concert of music for oboe, piano and strings by the Sheffield-based virtuoso chamber group, Ensemble 360. Mozart’s delightful oboe quartet starts things off and the programme finishes with an arrangement of a Strauss waltz followed by Schumann’s exuberant piano quintet.

The full programme for Ilkley Concert Club 2014/15 can be seen at www.concertclub.ilkley.org.

Brochures with application forms are available at local libraries, Ilkley Tourist Information Centre or by calling 01943 608585. Season tickets are always popular so you are advised to get your applications in fast. There are always a few tickets available for individual concerts which can be reserved now.